George Clooney's The Ides of March: The year's first Oscar 'sure-thing'?

The WeekStaff

George Clooney's latest directorial film "The Ides of March" debuted at the Venice International Movie Festival this week and is already inciting a flurry of Oscar talk. Alessandra Benedetti/Corbis

September 1, 2011

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2011 has been a critical dud for Hollywood so far, with no film emerging as an obvious Best Picture contender (by last September, Inception, The Kids Are All Right, and Toy Story 3 had already been released). The political thriller The Ides of March, directed by and starring George Clooney, could be that first Oscar "sure-thing." The acclaimed film, about a charismatic presidential candidate and his conflicted young campaign manager, opened the Venice Film Festival Wednesday. Is it really good enough to warrant the "O" word?

Actually, the film isn't that good:Ides offers nothing but a few "ho-hum insights into the corruption of American politics," says Justin Chang at Variety, and mistakes those insights for "staggering revelations." It's fitting that the film centers on a press secretary who isn't as smart as he thinks, because "something similar could be said about this intriguing but overly portentous drama.""Ides of March"